LANSING, MI -- The Michigan House Appropriations Committee on Wednesday added road money to a Senate supplemental bill but stripped out several other priority spending provisions, setting up a legislative showdown likely to play out over the course of the next two weeks.

Observers expected the bill to be controversial because it forced the Senate to revisit Medicaid expansion, but it sailed through the upper chamber with the help of several line-item appropriations -- many of which were removed from the House substitute now heading to the floor.

Compared to the Senate-approved spending plan, the House supplemental would:

• Add $115 million for road maintenance and construction projects. That's on top of the $100 million in reserve fund road spending approved by the Senate. The $215 million would come out of the general fund and a Road and Risks Reserve Fund established last year.

• Remove $6.7 million in state funding for the Detroit Medical Center, which would allow it to access another $13.3 million in federal dollars for continued investments in infant mortality research and treatment at the Hutzel Women's Hospital.

• Remove $2 million for administrative start-up costs associated with the newly-formed Regional Transit Authority seeking to bring a high-speed bus system to Metro Detroit. The authority's first-ever CEO stepped down last month absent the ability to hire any staff.

• Remove $2 million to help municipalities clear trees that fell during a late December ice storm that also knocked out power in communities across the state.

• Remove $5.5 million to convert the iconic Steelcase "pyramid building" in West Michigan into a science, technology, engineering and math education hub. The furniture company is donating the building to a "mystery" nonprofit.

• Remove $114 million for the Department of Community Health that would have offset unexpectedly low revenues from the state's new Health Insurance Claims Assessment tax. There is a $100 placeholder designed to stimulate continued debate.

All told, the House supplemental calls for $194 million in general fund appropriations for the current year, down from $264 million approved by the Senate.

"We're proud of the decisions we've made," said state Rep. Joe Haveman (R-Holland), who chairs the House Appropriations Committee. "Not everybody is going to get what they want, of course."

"I respect their right to make mistakes," Richardville said, flashing a wry smile as he discussed the House proposal with reporters. "We knew in advance we had different ways of getting the votes together. We got 32 of them here, and they're going to have to get them on both sides of the aisle.

"Ours was to put things in that we thought rounded the package, necessary things that we thought would be helpful to the state of Michigan, and the other side of the Capitol thinks it's better to start from as little as possible and see if they can get it done that way."

The full House is expected to vote on the substitute spending bill on Thursday, sending it back to the Senate next week. If the Senate does not concur, which appears likely, the bill would head to a conference committee, where lawmakers from each chamber would sit down to hammer out differences.

The hope is to finalize the spending plan by mid-March, when the "Healthy Michigan" plan to expand Medicaid under the Affordable Care Act takes effect. That law assumed state savings from federal dollars, but the Senate did not give it immediate effect, creating a funding shortfall that could soon jeopardize community mental health programs around the state.

Both the House and Senate supplemental bills include $65 million in Medicaid make-up dollars for the Michigan Department of Community Health, along with another $25 million for non-Medicaid community mental health services.

The $114 million HICA shortfall, meanwhile, is an immediate problem that will require a long-term solution. Haveman said it would be inappropriate to apply a one-time fix, but minority Democrats accused Republicans of trying to cull favor for new auto reform insurance legislation that includes a $25 per-policy HICA assessment for motorists.

"We still have an ongoing problem that needs to be fixed from this year going forward, but it just seems like bad policy to hold this important policy hostage to what is a very contentious and important debate," said state Rep. Brandon Dillon (D-Grand Rapids). "We should not be interlinking the two."

Jonathan Oosting is a Capitol reporter for MLive Media Group. Email him, find him on Google+ or follow him on Twitter.